Representative image
As per a report by the state-backed Science and Technology Daily, China claims its massive Sky Eye telescope may have gathered indications of life beyond Earth. However, the recordings were apparently deleted post the discovery. The world's largest radio telescope -- Sky Eye -- caught some narrow-band electromagnetic signals. They were distinct from earlier captured signals. The team is additionally analysing them, the report cited Zhang Tonjie, chief scientist of an extraterrestrial civilisation search team co-founded by Beijing Normal University, the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the University of California, Berkeley.
It is also assumed that the said questionable signals could also be because of some sort of radio interference that needs additional investigation, Zhang added.
As of now, it is not understandable why the report was seemingly withdrawn from the website of the Science and Technology Daily, the official newspaper of China's science and technology ministry. However, the news had already made it to the Internet and was trending on the social network Weibo. It was subsequently reported by other media outlets, including state-run ones.
For the unversed, China officially launched a search for extraterrestrial life in September 2020 with the help of Sky Eye. It is placed in China's southwestern Guizhou province. It is the world's largest telescope and has a diameter of 500 meters (1,640 feet).
In 2020, the team had also recorded two sets of suspicious signals when it was processing the data that was collected in 2019. Later, in 2022 another such signal was seen in observation data of exoplanet targets, Zhang said, according to the report.
China's Sky Eye is exceptionally susceptible in the low-frequency radio band and has significant part to play in the probe for alien civilisations, Zhang is reported to have said.
